Electric Flight: A Rewrite
by DreamRebellion
Summary: The ground was soaked in water, the remnants of smoke and charring on several planes. The majority of them were dead, or close to it. They probably wished they were.


**For any of you who were around when I was still writing Electric Flight... this is a rewrite of the final chapter (NOT the epilogue). It should be standalone, so I really don't plan on rewriting anything else from that story. I wanted to see for myself how far I've come in my writing style since then. You can view the original story in my profile if you'd like.**

 **This is also adjusted to account for Mechanical Tyranny, as there was some discrepancy between Tera's published backstory and what occurred before the Mechanical Tyranny arc. Some mentioned characters are FizzGryphon's.**

Tera quietly rolled out of her father's hangar, yawning and trying to look awake. It was around eleven, so everyone else was already up and about. Everyone else _also_ knew that she was the only plane on base that slept in, but it didn't matter to her. She didn't want to look like it. The sun felt nice, though, and it was making her even more sleepy than before.

Looking around, she found that there wasn't really anyone… except Tony, who was working on someone in the repair ward. It was a Hellcat she'd seen around occasionally, but never spoken to. It didn't seem like he wanted to be. She didn't care much. Everyone she talked to seemed to be set on getting her to join the military anyways.

 _Especially_ Tony. He'd brought it up a few weeks after the Jolly Wrenches, or so they apparently became known as, left the base. No more F-18s, he said. Just Air Force. Specifically stealth planes. Nighthawks. She could do the same things as them, he told her.

But she always said no. She wanted to race. Heck, she was getting better at it by the day… her dad even said so. Maybe she'd be ready for her first trials next summer. She could only hope it'd make them stop badgering her.

"Hey, Tera?" It was Tony. He'd finished whatever he'd been doing.

She'd been spacing out, possibly falling asleep again. In the middle of the 'courtyard' area, no less. "What?"

He almost chuckled. "...what time did you go to sleep last night?"

"It's not that! The sun just felt good," she protested, rolling away from him.

"And you're reflecting a lot of it. It'd be a safety hazard if everyone wasn't so high up. If you were a darker color-"

"Don't even think about it." Tera was certainly awake now.

"Just a thought," he shrugged, but from the look in his eyes, Tera could tell he wasn't going to let it go. Hopefully her father wouldn't agree with him. "Anyways… I need you to run over to Sky Harbor again. There's a couple of specialty parts coming in today."

"...you want me to go now?"

"Preferably."

"But the Nighthawks… and where the heck is my dad, anyways?"

Tony gestured upwards. "You can't see them, but they're there. Jake, too. You'll be fine getting out of here and coming back as long as you stay lower than them."

"But those guys are creepy."

"Just go. They're not gonna hurt you."

She sighed. It was something to do. "Fine."

"Good. See ya later, then," he responded, heading off to go do other things… but Tera couldn't shake the feeling that something was off. Her father _never_ flew. But then again, she'd never seen how he trained Nighthawks, either. Just something else to get used to, she supposed.

And with that, she headed towards the runway, glad that she'd slept with a mostly full fuel tank. At least she'd get _some_ flying in today.

xXx

Training stealth planes wasn't the most thrilling… but wheeling about in the sky was much more thrilling than the Have Blue aircraft remembered. Of course Jake made sure to keep an eye on his fleet, but his mind was certainly wandering.

Tony had confronted his daughter again the night before. And every time it got more forceful. Tera was well above the 'minimum age' to join the military… technically Jake didn't have any jurisdiction over her anymore. His influence was growing lesser by the day. Soon would come a time where she would have to make a decision for herself, though he didn't know if he could live with himself if she decided to become an Air Force plane. He had to keep her racing… it's what Cathy wanted… it was why Tera was even _modeled_ as a mixbreed ...

Someone clipped his wing, veering his circle and snapping him out of his daze. "WHAT was that?" he snarled, attempting to correct himself. He received a chorus of earsplitting static over his radio in reply… and then an explosion above him. And another. "REPORT!"

More static… and strange electronic tones. AI-speak. Great. "Use English!" More AI-speak. He tried to analyze the situation, catching another explosion out of the corner of his eye. It was all he could do to avoid the falling wreckage.

Another crash. A full size Nighthawk plummeted towards the ground. Jake couldn't change course fast enough - it came down on top of him. His engines strained in the attempt to get out from under it, but it was no use.

The ground greeted him much faster than he expected.

xXx

Stupid TSA.

Stupid, _stupid_ TSA.

 _Why_ did she have to be pulled aside? Yes, she was from Luke Air Force Base. No, she was not military. No, she did not have any weapons. If they _insisted_ on another full inspection, there would be even more injuries dealt out. She didn't regret biting the one forklift. He deserved it. Even if they held her an extra hour as a result. Oh, well. Tera couldn't wait to get back to the base.

Smoke and fire billowed into the air. As she drew closer to the base, she could barely even see her propeller in front of her. Hopefully she could get on the ground before it impacted her too much.

Her radio crackled to life. " _Wingston 3, are you crazy? Get out of there!"_

"Why?"

" _Runways one and two are blocked. You're going to have to circle until further notice. Stay out of the smoke."_

"But WHAT HAPPENED?!" she practically yelled, trying to keep from coughing as she exited the cloud she'd flown into.

" _Just circle and keep the line clear."_

She sighed, a pit forming in her tank… but as she maneuvered to comply for the time being, she managed to find a place with more visibility.

No.

Nonono.

There were Nighthawks scattered everywhere. In pieces.

Tera put her radio offline and landed on one of the clear side roads, doing anything she could to get closer to the massive wreckage.

"You shouldn't have landed like that."

She jumped. Steve. "Where's my dad...?"

The F-16 had blocked her path. His visor was down, expression unreadable. "The fire crews need to work. Stay out of their way."

"JUST TELL ME."

He sighed. "They haven't found him yet."

"...what?"

"You need to get back to your hangar."

As soon as he moved, though, Tera bolted into the middle of the action. "DAD?!" she shouted, trying to push past the emergency vehicles. The ground was soaked in water, the remnants of smoke and charring on several planes. The majority of them were dead, or close to it. They probably wished they were.

She froze. Several forklifts and a heavy-duty truck were pulling another plane… off of… "No… nononononono…"

Someone caught her by the tail. She shrieked, slamming her emergency brakes. No use. Steve didn't even have to try in order to overpower her. "You're making everyone's jobs more difficult. Come. On. Now."

"NO! LET ME GO!" she practically howled, starting her engine and attempting to turn on him. He knew her tricks, though. All she did was scratch his paint a little.

He barely even flinched, moving her away from the center of the commotion. Tera was forced to watch as her father was quickly but gently loaded onto a strange-looking vehicle. Tony was already breaking into the plane's trashed internal systems, shouting orders to the others helping him. Steve practically shoved Tera onto the side road to her home. "You need to go."

The plane couldn't think. She was still struggling - albeit weakly - against him, painfully transfixed on the scene. Tears glistened on her windshield. "He's gonna be okay… right?"

"I don't know. Stop fighting and go to your hangar… I'll come get you if anything happens."

She sighed, closing her eyes. "...you promise?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

"...okay." Surrendering for the time being, she turned around to go with Steve… the hangar wasn't too far away, anyways.

But once Steve made sure she got inside, she heard a faint _click_ from the door. She whipped around and rammed into it, but it was no use. Since when was that hangar designed to lock people _in?_ The plane panicked, accidentally knocking over a couple shelves as she tried to escape. "WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!"

"I promise I'll come get you soon… but I had orders. You can't be in the way. It would _hurt_ your father more than help him."

Tera broke into a mess of cursing and tears as she heard the F-16 grow distant.

xXx

Jake was somehow still conscious. Tony didn't know _how_ , but he was… which would make this much harder than it would have been. He went through the motions of diagnostics, making sure the other forklifts with him knew what exactly needed to be repaired… and when the transport vehicle eventually put the plane down in the repair ward, he gradually managed to put all of the other forklifts on other tasks outside the hangar. More than enough planes had crashed.

As soon as they left, he immediately opened up the plane's cockpit, allowing smoke to escape before going after his black box.

"What are you…" Jake choked out, coughing in a futile attempt to clear his crushed air intakes.

Tony shushed him.

The plane immediately tried to unfold his landing gear, but it took little effort on Tony's part to keep him down. "Where's-"

"Your hangar. She's safe," he said, grabbing his torch before going back over to him. "Goodnight, Jake." And with that, he pulled the life-support connections from the black box, jamming the torch into each of the ports before plugging the wires back in. It'd look like fire damage.

"...you killed him."

Tony jumped. An F-16 was sitting in the doorway. The rest of the crews were thankfully still working.

"You just freaking _killed him_."

"I was under orders."

"Theirs," he started, closing the door behind him. "Or _yours_?"

He paused, putting some distance between Steve and himself. "I voiced my concerns and They gave me a course of action. If he would've been paying attention to his fleet he could've avoided it."

"Who else knows about this?" He wouldn't dare look at the corpse in the room, his glare fixated solely on Tony. "Obviously not anyone with a sense of ethics."

"...Icarus."

"And he was _okay_ with it?" The plane continued to make advances on him, all of his control surfaces raised. "Because that's _murder_."

"I never said he was okay with it. I said he knew. He needed to. A Nighthawk is receiving asylum here."

"And what am I supposed to tell Tera? I just left her in a _locked_ hangar promising I'd come get her if something happened! She didn't even get to say _good-bye_."

"Let her wear herself out for a day or so. She'll take it easily enough."

"And somehow you're a medic."

"...it was for the greater good. He was putting the base in danger. And Tera. If that accident hadn't been controlled like it was there'd be a lot more casualties than there needed to be."

"Are _you_ looking to be a casualty? Because I'd shut up if I were you." He let the words linger in the air, satisfied with the resulting silence. "I'm bringing Tera down here tomorrow morning, and _you're_ going to explain it. I don't care if you have a story or not."

"Oh, I do."

Steve growled, opening the door to leave. "You're a sick excuse of a human being."

xXx

Tera was quivering when Steve finally unlocked the door to the hangar, staring aimlessly at the wall.

"Come on, Tony needs to talk to you."

Her voice sounded unnaturally hoarse. "...is dad okay."

"...I'm not authorized. Please… just come with me."

She turned, making eye contact with him for a moment. That was all it took. She glanced back down again, moving to practically huddle under his wing. He shouldn't have left her isolated for that long.

Neither of them said another word until they had made it to the repair ward, where the forklift was waiting patiently, setting up some other equipment as he did so. Jake's corpse had long since been removed. As soon as Tony saw them, however, he stopped, sighing a little. "...I'm sure you already know what this means…"

"He's dead, isn't he." The small plane looked as if she couldn't breathe. Steve backed off. The blistering summer heat was bad enough.

"I'll spare you the details… you don't survive being crushed by a plane twice your size. It just doesn't work like that. He was trying to make sure you were safe, and the safest place you could've been was your hangar. He wouldn't have wanted you in the middle of that. Tera, I'm so sorry..."

She'd lowered herself on her landing gear, barely even listening to what was going on. She couldn't think, her breath shallow as she stared into empty space. "No… it's not true… where is he… this is a horrible joke _where is he_."

Tony had begun moving equipment around again, trying to figure out an answer to Tera's question. "...I wish I was joking. It's a tragedy. We lost almost three quarters of that fleet yesterday, and I've got another hangar full of others that were injured."

Steve suddenly realized what exactly Tony was doing. "Is that paint? Are you _kidding?_ "

"It's either now or I'm going to have to ground her until I can."

"At a time like _this._ Seriously. _Tony_."

Tera reversed, trying to get out of the hangar. "No… nonono don't…"

"TSA filed a complaint yesterday. You don't have the identification markings they want you to."

Steve jumped into action, trying to move the forklift away from the plane. "Leave her alone. It can wait."

"I'd rather her fly _today_ instead of next week!"

The F-16 glanced at the crossbreed, then back to the forklift. "I'm not helping you. If she gets away, she gets away." And with a disappointed sigh, he left the room. Tera didn't seem up for fighting, looking more scared and lost than anything else… Steve didn't want to leave her, but he couldn't keep her trapped there either. It was the only way he could disobey.

He looked back for a second, only to find that the plane was barely even flinching as Tony began taping off her landing gear. Tony must've planned it. He'd planned everything else. Tera wasn't going to fight.

xXx

When Tera was finally released, she'd been painted a solid dark green, silver block letters above her wing designating her home base, status as a civilian, and identification number. It was nothing special... not nearly as flashy as her original paintwork had been. She didn't like it. Her expression said it all.

Steve had been waiting patiently - at the very least he could make sure she didn't hurt herself somehow - but instead, Tera was even more docile than before. "Why does he _always_ get his way?" she asked, self-consciously trying to get to a side road.

"...if he always got his way, you'd have been in the military a long time ago."

She looked up at him. "...is that why everyone…"

"Yeah. I mean, it's only natural. You take so much after your father… that, and your fling with Foxtrot… there were a lot of people thinking he had you hooked right then."

"Shut up. He's Navy." She suppressed a look of embarrassment.

Steve had to chuckle. "I can't _believe_ Jake didn't find out." He looked back, making sure they were alone before he continued. "There's something really serious I need to tell you though."

Tera almost stopped in her tracks. "...what?"

He sighed. "A lot more is at play than you think… more than I really want to let you know. Since Jake…" he paused, not wanting to say it himself. "Tony's filing a draft order on you."

"What?!"

"Not so loud!" he said, gesturing for her to keep moving. "...I wouldn't tell you this if he hadn't been doing some... questionable... things lately. You'll probably join eventually, but I don't want it to be because of him."

"But I don't want to join _at all._ I'm a racer!" she said indignantly, her propeller spinning a little at the mention.

"Tony gave you a full tank when he was done painting you, didn't he?"

"Yeah…"

"He wants you to burn off steam before your induction. I know you're hurting right now, and yesterday was really bad… but you need to use that fuel to get out of here."

"What…?" she couldn't comprehend what he was saying, staring at him with utter confusion.

He paused. "The funeral for your father is going to be held tomorrow… you're going to have to make your escape after that. Either you leave or Tony _will_ have his way with you. Would Jake want that?"

Tera looked away from him. "...no."

They had made it back to her hangar. "...I don't know if I'm going to get a chance to talk to you again, so I'm just going to warn you. Don't fly over the ocean, and _don't_ get caught in any storms. You're not used to currents like that."

She nodded slightly. "Okay. Um…"

"What?"

"Where am I supposed to go?"

"It doesn't matter… not another military base. They'll just send you back."

She sighed, closing her eyes. "I wish I could stay…"

"I know… but you know what?"

"What?"

"...they're gonna give you a folded flag tomorrow. Take it with you… and you'll be taking your father too."

"Really?"

"That's what I like to think." The winds picked up, a little more dust blowing around than normal. "You should get inside. That paint probably isn't dry yet."

She looked uncomfortable at the mention. "Okay. Thanks, Steve."

"You're welcome. See you later," he said warmly, making sure she was in the hangar before leaving for his own. Dust storms weren't fun for anyone.

xXx

The base looked bleak as ever when the funeral was held - few were even in a state to attend, or had obligations they couldn't leave. And yet somehow Tony was there. Tera couldn't even look at him. In fact, she avoided the gaze of most everyone… the apologetic expressions were just too much.

She didn't pay much attention to the ceremony itself. She couldn't. It didn't feel like it was happening… not even when she received the folded flag like Steve said. Didn't she just _talk_ to her dad a couple days ago?

It made her feel better about running, at least. None of this was real anyways. She should explore.

The events concluded, leaving Tera the recipient of more sympathy than she knew what to do with. She didn't want to cry in front of everyone. Even if she felt more numb than anything… her tears were involuntary. Trying to think, she quickly convinced a forklift to put the folded flag in her storage compartment, making her exit with the excuse that she needed to be alone.

Why _was_ she crying?

Starting her engine, she didn't even wait a moment before taking off, climbing as high as she could before she circled a few times, quickly deciding on a direction to head in before doing just that.

Her disappearance was seamless.

xXx

It took several hours for anyone to notice that Tera hadn't come back from her flight. Steve couldn't tell if Tony was worried or outraged, but he found it amusing. He was careful to keep his expression blank, however.

The forklift shoved his mobile computer backwards in frustration. "Why the _heck_ would she just leave like that?! She doesn't know anyone off-base, she has literally _nothing_ to support herself with. Did you see her acting strange at the funeral? Did something happen that I don't know about?"

"It's called _grieving._ It makes people do weird things."

"But she's not _people_. She's AI. You don't see Alpha or any of the drones abandoning their homes."

"Alpha can't even fly."

"Not the point," he said, glaring at the smart-alecky F-16. "AI _simulate_ emotions. They don't take it to heart like that. Which means something's screwed up in her programming." He sighed, almost growling. "And now she's loose in the world. That's why I wanted to draft her in the first place."

"You have the missing vehicle report done, right?"

"Not yet. I'm gonna wait to see if she comes back."

"What, scared They'll fire you?"

"If there's anything I'm _concerned_ about, it's that They might make me deactivate her!"

Steve paused, eyes wide. "Oh."

"Yeah. So no one outside this base needs to know. Understood?"

He nodded.

"Good." Tony went over to the computer, moving it back to where it was originally. "Oh, and Icarus needs to see you about something. Just thought you should know."

"Alright… I hope she comes back."

"So do I."

Steve exited the hangar feeling even more guilty than he guessed.


End file.
